Ubisoft backtracks on PC DRM, citing customer feedback

There probably aren't many PC gamers who are big Ubisoft fans. In spite of owning a stable of massively successful franchises, including Assassin's Creed and Splinter Cell, Ubisoft has a long history of making life difficult for customers who play their titles on computers instead of consoles. PC versions of popular Ubisoft titles are released weeks or months after their console counterparts. Worse, Ubisoft PC games come saddled with onerous digital rights management (DRM), forcing reactivation after replacing a PC's video card or requiring the game to be continually online, as with Driver: San Francisco.

The times, though, might be changing a bit. In an interview with Rock Paper Shotgun, Ubisoft officials offer up several interesting revelations about their past statements on the efficacy of DRM and the future direction of the company's published titles. Right out of the gate, the company pulls the plug on the idea of always-on DRM for future titles. Stephanie Perotti, Ubisoft's worldwide director for online games, states, "We have listened to feedback, and since June last year our policy for all of PC games is that we only require a one-time online activation when you first install the game, and from then you are free to play the game offline."

This is a huge concession from a publisher widely regarded as being among the most PC-hostile in the business. RPS is quick to point out that just last month, Ubisoft's chairman and CEO stated that piracy rates on PC games were as high as 95 percent and that the free-to-play model was the only way to continue to draw revenue from the PC gaming market. High piracy rates have long been a rallying cry for publishers looking to apply increasingly draconian DRM to their titles. But there's obvious cognitive dissonance between Ubisoft's titles being buried under intrusive DRM schemes and simultaneously carrying a 95 percent piracy rate. It would seem the more it tightens its grasp, the more star systems slip between its fingers.

When asked about how to reconcile the gap—how can DRM be considered effective when the piracy rate is so high?—the response was evasive. "That," Perotti replied, referring to Ubisoft's statement that DRM is a success, "was an unfortunate comment."

The rest of the interview is a short but illuminating look at Ubisoft's take on PC gaming. The RPS interviewer is merciless, and hammers the two Ubisoft representatives on several points, even earning an admission from them that Ubisoft's failure to disclose its actual piracy numbers damaged its credibility and undermined the arguments in favor of always-on DRM in the first place. Still, the takeaway is positive: "We've listened to feedback, we will continue to listen to feedback, we will continue to make sure that we deliver great games and great services, and are now operating under this policy." says Perotti. "We’ve heard you. We’ve heard customers."

This is a win for gamers in general. Ubisoft stops short of acknowledging the assertion that restrictive DRM harms only paying customers—"I wouldn’t say that, actually," comments Perotti—but a quick search around the underbelly of the Internet reveals that acquiring a pirated copy of Driver: San Francisco is pretty darn easy in spite of its fancy DRM. The path is clearing for less-restrictive DRM schemes on Ubisoft titles in the future, though, which can only be a good thing. In many ways, always-on DRM and limited activations are even worse than the bad old days of code wheels and Lenslok. I for one, definitely don't miss those things.

Lee Hutchinson
Lee is the Senior Technology Editor at Ars and oversees gadget, automotive, IT, and culture content. He also knows stuff about enterprise storage, security, and manned space flight. Lee is based in Houston, TX. Emaillee.hutchinson@arstechnica.com//Twitter@Lee_Ars

This interview is just another example of how poorly Ubisoft handles their PR. These two put their foot in their mouth several times.

RPS has always been open and critical of their DRM scheme; how could you send two reps to talk to them while not giving them permission to talk about specifics? Of course RPS is going to ask, and of course you are going to look bad when you won't answer, and worse when you contradict yourselves.

Not only do they act as if they hate potential customers and as if everyone is trying to rob them blind.... they also make terrible games and rob the good ones of their potential for lasting fame.

Didn't the original brain for Assassin's Creed leave the company because they refused to stop creating bastardizations of a once great plot and game series for a quick buck? I remember reading something about how Ubisoft stated if they arn't releasing one every year, they're doing something wrong.... but I might be mistaken.

Either way. Ever since U-Play and From Dust....no thank you. You've lost this customer permanently.

So is UbiSoft going to disable this unwanted DRM on existing titles? And will they re-issue disks to paying customers so they can have a usable copy that isn't crippled by DRM that will eventually be disabled?

I applaud Ubisoft for being willing to admit a mistake. They claim to have tools in place to disable the DRM requirements on existing games in case of DRM server shutdown. Well, this would be a very good time to disable the DRM requirements as an additional show of good faith.

If Ubisoft does not patch and replace existing games, then this is nothing more than a marketing stunt.

"We have listened to feedback, and since June last year our policy for all of PC games is that we only require a one-time online activation when you first install the game, and from then you are free to play the game offline."

This game you could sort of play offline singleplayer, but was crippled with missing features when offline. If you start a game online to get those features then lose connection briefly you're dropped out of the game. If this is them after "listening to feedback" I don't think they're redeemable.

When I first saw the headline, I started singing "Ding Dong, The Witch Is Dead".

Of course, the actual information in the article isn't quite so worthy of a major song-and-dance routine. As Glenn pointed out, "I'll believe it when they patch it out of their current games". (Along with any older games that might still have it.)

By the way,

Quote:

It would seem the more it tightens its grasp, the more star systems slip between its fingers.

I purchased Anno 2070. I was actually amazed by the DRM, like... I've seen DRM before, and jumped through hoops before for games I legally purchased... This was on a whole other level. I think I had to enter the S/N 4 times, and install Uplay, and active 3 different things. The post-install DRM hoops took about 45 minutes to complete... forty-five minutes. (I didn't look to see who made it, not a mistake I will make again)

In the RPS interview, they said that roughly 7% of last year's revenue was due to PC (12% last quarter). So, using their 95% number, means that they lost 6.65% of their revenue to "piracy."

They shot themselves on the foot with this as well anyway. When you put a DRM onerous enough to prevent you from playing legitimate copy of the game, people aren't going to bother buying ligitimate copy of the game.

I've been known to pirate in the past, even Ubisoft games mentioned in the article, and quite honestly, I probably actually play these games like I own it 5-10% of the time tops. For sure. For example, Assassins Creed. I pirated that game. Then I installed it. Then I played for 15 minutes. At some later point it was uninstalled.

Just because I pirate games, does not mean you lost sales. I quite frankly have limited funds. I make less than a grand a month. The games I do buy, I am highly selective of. Skyrim, Battlefield 3, Diablo 3, Batman:AS, I bought. I pirated both Skyrim and Batman before buying them. I also have a steam games list that humbled everyone who ever saw it.

Now this is only myself I speak for, but in my view piracy has enabled me to become a "richer" man by being soundly informed about what I am considering buying. I still hand out my cash, but I do it as a fan of what I am buying, not in the hopes that I wasn't lied to by reviews bought and paid for by the people trying to sell me their products.

I believe what this means is there is a HUMONGOUS gap between the consumer and companies. Why can't we meet in the middle, and let the best products win? I think the biggest enemies of piracy are the entities with the least creativity.

Part of the problem is simply the ridiculous prices they're asking for games these days.

$60 is simply more than I'm willing to pay for new titles... and a big reason for that is that so few companies release demos or shareware-style previews any more. There are a few games I simply would NOT have bought if I'd been able to preview them first. There are also some games I DID buy after playing the preview for like 5 minutes.

Either way, I tend to wait for the price to come down before buying a game. Game of the year or not, I didn't buy Skyrim until it was $30 on Steam (and I kind of feel I wasted my money.) On the other hand, I bought 2 indie racing games on the PS3 a couple weekends ago, and I thought they were great purchases for the money. I bought Trackmania United for around $30 on Steam, and I played it nearly every night for a solid 3 months... it got me through a summer with nothing new on the TV.

Look at Minecraft: I've bought it 3 times, in all: once for myself, once for my kid, and another copy for guests to play on. While that has come out to more than the $60 I'd pay for a new AAA title, it's something that I've been playing on and off for more than a year.

On the other hand, games like Driver:SF are only going to hold my attention for a few days. I completed the main story line in a weekend. While I thought it was an interesting game, It's sat on a shelf since then. I have a hard time spending $60 for something that I'll play for a week or so, when there's so much else out there for half the price that has so much more replay value.

not mean you lost sales. I quite frankly have limited funds. I make less than a grand a month. The games I do buy, I am highly selective of. Skyrim, Battlefield 3, Diablo 3, Batman:AS, I bought. I pirated both Skyrim and Batman before buying them. I also have a steam games list that humbled everyone who ever saw it.

Back in the 80's and 90's, a LOT of games were distributed on the Shareware model. The original Doom, for example, the game that really launched LAN play and is responsible for kicking off the FPS genre, was sold this way: you could download the first 1/3 of the game for free. Episodes 2 and 3 only came in a retail box. And it sold. A lot. It was also pirated a lot, since it had no DRM of any kind.

But ID software still made wheelbarrow loads of money.

My point is: where have the demos gone? I think a lot of people who are hesitant about buying would feel more confident if they had demos to play. At least on consoles, you can rent at the Redbox. You can't do that with PC games, which is really too bad.

I'm no fan of their always-on DRM, but I love their games(AC, Driver San Fran), so I'm in a conflicted position.My policy is checking if the games have the DRM removed, and only buying them after.So far, there are only 2 or 3 games that still maintain always-on requirements, and that's because they abandoned support for the games anyway.Here is a partial list, it's not Steam specific. http://steamdrm.flibitijibibo.com/index ... ft_drm.txtRayman Origins was launched DRM Free in retail.

... Just because I pirate games, does not mean you lost sales. I quite frankly have limited funds. I make less than a grand a month. The games I do buy, I am highly selective of. Skyrim, Battlefield 3, Diablo 3, Batman:AS, I bought. I pirated both Skyrim and Batman before buying them. I also have a steam games list that humbled everyone who ever saw it.

Gotta wave the bullshit flag here. If you've got a limited income, under $1000 a month, what the hell are you doing wasting $60+ on new games for? Even when I made that in a week, I didn't buy stuff fresh on the shelves, I waited until it hit $20 or even $10. I found other things to do than pay to be a beta tester, and in the year or two it took (or 6 months in some cases) they released patches OR they went belly up and stopped supporting it. No crushed feelings here, either.

Nowadays, I hardly have time for them. Still can't beat Railroad Tycoon 2 (Platinum) anyway.

Too little too late. If Ubisoft came up with a faithful remake of System Shock for modern hardware I might be tempted, but what are they offering? The nail on the other side of the Ubisoft coffin is that their games are not much good.

...but WHY??? These online activation based DRM schemes may stop people from borrowing and playing a friend's copy (while the friend is not using it, as you would still need the physical disk to play), but they actually ENCOURAGE online piracy, since a "cracked" copy does not have the DRM. Ubi ought to be asking themselves which of these two things is the bigger problem for them. I actually think that I ought to be able to lend a friend a copy of a purchased game after I have finished playing it, just as I might lend them a book/DVD/etc..

The first time I encountered online activation based DRM I had trouble with it and ended up downloading a cracked copy instead, in spite of the fact that I had a legally purchased, never-activated boxed copy. It was just easier to download than to figure out why the DRM was causing a problem. Then I (perhaps irrationally??) felt like a complete sucker for having spent good money on the boxed copy of the game which I never used. I have not purchased any game requiring online activation since simply because I do not want that hassle. Ubi et al have now lost me as a paying customer.

Ubi really ought to pull their heads out of the sand and stop encouraging piracy in this ridiculous manner. Once they finally do this their shareholders will thank them.

I also remember a scheme where the manual came with a special sheet of colored plastic. The game would send you to a page in the manual, and you had to use the plastic to make out a code in a mess of multicolor dots. Copy protection that attempted to defeat physical copiers!